Vast majority of criminal court decisions still go unpublished, report shows
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A vast majority of criminal court judges throughout the state do not publish their decisions or opinions, according to a new report. Eagle photo by David Brand
By Noah Powelson
A vast majority of criminal court judges in New York do not choose to publish the decisions they make in the cases they oversee, a new report released this week found.
While a number of judges have chosen to publish more decisions in recent years, a vast majority of the opinions made in courtrooms across the state remain hidden – though a few lawmakers, including one from Queens, are hoping to soon change that.
Government watchdog groups Scrutinize and Reinvent Albany released their “The State of Criminal Court Transparency in 2024” report this week, a follow up to data previously released in 2023 that showed only an estimated 6 percent of court decisions are published every year. The new report shows that some judges have taken significant efforts to publish their opinions but the vast majority still elect not to.
The lack of published opinions leaves the public with little idea of how a judge operates inside a courtroom, the report's authors said.
“Without published decisions, voters and judicial reappointment committees cannot properly evaluate judges seeking another term,” the report reads. “Despite this push for reform, transparency remains the exception rather than the norm.”
According to the report, of the tens of thousands of criminal cases judges oversaw last year, only 130 New York judges published at least one decision for a combined total of 394 court decisions published in 2024. The numbers show a slight increase from 2023, when judges published 373 criminal court decisions.
Additionally, 39 counties published fewer than one decision per 100,000 residents in 2024 while 32 counties did not publish a single criminal court decision at all.
Data for civil court decisions were not included in the report.
In Queens, a total of 48 decisions were published in 2024, which ranks high when compared to counties outside of the city. However, compared to the other boroughs, Queens ranks toward the bottom.
Brooklyn published the most out of the five boroughs with 90 court decisions in 2024. The Bronx published the second most with 71.
The only borough that published less than Queens in 2024 was Staten Island with 6 published decisions.
While Queens as a whole didn’t publish decisions at a clip to put them at the top of the pack, one Queens judge ranked among the 10 judges who published the most opinions in 2024. And a second Queens judge was among those who vastly increased their number of published opinions year over year.
Judge Wanda Licitra published 23 court decisions in 2024, nearly half of the total for the entire borough. Judge Michael Yavinksy, who previously did not publish any court decisions in 2023, published six in 2024.
Neither Licitra nor Yavinsky could be reached for comment on Monday.
“A few judges are leading the way, but transparency shouldn’t be optional,” Rachael Fauss, senior policy advisor at Reinvent Albany, said in a statement. “New Yorkers have a right to see the decisions that judges make, and deserve a court system where every decision is public by default. It’s time for the Legislature to act and make judicial transparency the law.”
The report was published the same week Senate Bill S3864, otherwise known as the Criminal Court Opinion Transparency Act, was passed by the State Senate’s Judiciary Committee. The Criminal Court Opinion Transparency Act, sponsored by Queens State Senator Michael Gianaris, would require the state to publish criminal court opinions on motions to exclude expert testimony, dismiss charges, suppress evidence, omnibus motions and many others.
The New York State Senate passed the bill 42 to 18 in 2024, but it ultimately died in the Assembly. It’s been reintroduced for the 2025 legislative session and currently sits in the State Senate’s Finance Committee.
“New Yorkers deserve a court system that is transparent and accountable,” Gianaris said in a statement. “The gravity of these decisions warrants greater openness and my proposal will ensure the rights of everyone in our legal system are protected and judges’ records are clear for the public to see.”
Court officials oppose the bill and claim that it would create a bureaucratic nightmare. On top of the major costs associated with the legislation, court leaders say the bill, which would create a more robust public record of criminal proceedings than what currently exists, would interfere with the recently passed Clean Slate Act, which allows for the automatic sealing of criminal records.
“While the Unified Court System encourages judges to publish cases of interest and supports transparency, the bill as drafted poses immense operational burdens far beyond the ability of the Unified Court System to handle, puts the objectives of the recent Clean Slate legislation at risk, and would divert scarce resources (such as court reporters) from work essential to the timely provision of justice," the spokesperson said. "Nevertheless, we are continuing to work with our partners in the State Legislature to address the goals of the proposed legislation.”
Government watchdog groups like Scrutinize say publishing judges’ decisions is imperative to maintain accountability in the courtroom.
“If you don't know what's happening, you can't formulate an opinion about what's happening or not in the administration of justice. You need some kind of system to hold the actors involved accountable," Oded Oren, the founder and executive director of Scrutinize, told the Eagle.
Oren said written opinions are crucial for voters and legislators to evaluate a judges’ performance and understand how they interpret the constitution.
Under New York State law, judges have discretion over which opinions they choose to or not to publish. Oren said there could be any number of reasons why judges chose not to publish, including high workloads and hesitancy to publish decisions that are not novel.
On the other side, a judge may wish to publish their opinions on cases that receive heavy media attention to maintain transparency and avoid any accusations of being unfair.
Justice Juan Merchan, for example, was one of the top ten judges listed in the report who published his court decisions in 2024. Those 11 decisions, however, all came out of Donald Trump’s heavily-scrutinized criminal case for falsifying business records, which Merchan, who is from Queens but serves in Manhattan, oversaw.
But advocates and some legislators say giving judges the choice is not sufficient, and that true transparency won’t come without legislative intervention.
“By requiring the publication of opinions on fundamental legal issues, we create accountability in our judicial system and ensure that New Yorkers can trust in the fair and consistent application of the law," Assemblymember Chris Burdick, sponsor of the Assembly version of The Criminal Court Opinion Transparency Act, said in a statement.
